...The issue is about scandals and focusing attention on problems. The statement about whether scandals are more useful than speakers or reformers in focusing attention on problems is a complex one. Scandals have both a good side and a bad side in the process of revealing problems. And speakers and reformers are irreplaceable by scandals. On the one hand, scandals are useful to attract the public attention to the seriousness of the problem such as corruption, food safety and murder which is hard to be tackled by speaker and reformer in China. Scandals, which reflect the ugliness of human nature, provide a valuable clue to trace back to the source of the problems. Take an example from China to illustrate this point, Zhengfu Lei, whose sex media was leaked out from the internet firstly, was soon caught with discovery of corruption. Surprisingly, He was considered to be a decent official in the past years. It can be seen the power of scandal in this example. Corruption is ubiquitous in the world, and laws cannot bring the criminals to justice easily and effectively without the help of scandals. Even if speakers and reformers racked their minds, it cannot rival a small story of scandals. On the other hand, scandals will also move the public attention from the real matter itself to something largely irrelevant. Sometimes people are more interesting in the scandals than tackling problems when the problem is not so big or it doesn’t have detrimental to their interests. For example...
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...REFLECTIVE ESSAY #4 What a week last week was. Most the lessons touched me in some way. I liked the discipline model and progressive discipline process. It reminded me on how discipline should be handled. I have seen the progressive discipline model in action and when it is was done right it worked. Once again the speech was a little nerve racking, but I got through it. I missed a lot of my introduction because I got flustered. After I got over my initial nervousness the rest was smooth. It flowed pretty good and I had a good closing. Now I know that I need a little more practice with my speech before jumping into it. I know that I can do better on it so I will use my experience on the last two speeches to improve on the next one. Effective negotiations was an eye opener in the aspect that I do a lot of the technics that were taught, but didn’t know I was using them. I am defiantly more integrative then distributive. I like to build that relationship then to “burn the bridge” with people. I try to make sure that everyone is happy with the out come of the discussion and that everyone got what they wanted. Sometimes it’s not possible and I feel like I have failed when that happen. Continuous improvement was a little difficult to wrap my head around at times. As soon as I thought I had a grasp on it I would get the question that was posed wrong. System 1 and system 2 thinking was like that, but by the end of the lesson I had a better understanding of the...
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...BELIEFS/IDEAS/CULTURE: * Thesis and historical context for literary contributors to Progressivism (2 and throughout) * Social Darwinism (3) * New developments in social science (4) * Progressive education reformers and proposals (9) * Temperance and prohibition (12) * Social Gospel (13) * Teddy Roosevelt and American popular culture (15) * AMERICA IN THE WORLD: * GEOGRAPHY & ENVIRONMENT: * T. Roosevelt, Taft, Wilson, and conservationism (17) (Note: don’t mistake “conservationism” with “conservatism.” Students confuse the two words often because they look similar, have common roots, and pop up in stories about Republicans.) * PEOPLING: * Peopling of the U.S. during the Gilded Age (6) * Hull House and other aid efforts for immigrants (10) * IDENTITY: * Theodore Roosevelt and race (16) * Woodrow Wilson and race (21) * POLITICS & POWER: * Muckrakers, their publications, and famous works (5 and throughout) (Note: it’s “MUCK-ray-kers,” not “MUCK-crackers.”) * Political machines: definition (including understanding the metaphor); famous examples; pros/cons; political and journalistic reaction (7) * Examples of local progressive reform in the northeast (8) * Progressive legal and political reform at national and state levels (11) * Civil Service reform (13)...
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...As the 1800s came closer and the beginning of a new century appeared, America experienced many problems due to rapid urbanization, industrialization, and immigration. As a result, many Americans found it very hard to make changes in society to improve life for everyone. These Americans were known as Progressives and they pushed for reform aggressively. One of the most famous Progressives was our 26th president, Theodore Roosevelt. He prompted reform in many different areas and as a result created his own political party, The Progressive Party, nicknamed The Bull Moose Party. The Progressives wanted to control many economical issues that were impacting society. Its platform included women's suffrage, tariff reduction, stricter regulations on businesses, a ban on child labor, an eight-hour work day, a federal workers' compensation program, and the direct election of senators. Political machines - powerful organizations linked to political parties - controlled local government in many cities. In each ward, or political district, within a city, a machine representative controlled jobs and services. This representative was the political boss. The bosses gained votes for their parties by doing favors for the people such as offering turkey dinners and summer boat rides, providing jobs for immigrants, and helping needy families. A political boss was often a citizen’s closest link with local government. Although they did help people, many bosses were dishonest. Robert la Follette...
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...The Progressive Era Ryan Keohane The Progressive Era In the present day progressive can be a tricky word to define. It means many things to many people. Simply put by definition it signifies people promoting and applying social reform, or in other words “liberal” ideas. Americans in the 19th and early 20th century acquired the opportunity to witness progressivism first hand in what is known as the progressive era. This movement dealt primarily with political, economic, moral, and social restructuring. The progressive idea gave American people hope for a better life by attacking the unfair abuses and corruption that was occurring. There were highs and lows during this time that I will further discuss throughout this paper. By the year 1890, 9 percent of America’s population controlled 71 percent of the nation’s wealth. This figure shows how much capitalism had really spread. In the year of 1896 the establishment of a progressive reform began way. Americans started to question economic, political, and cultural changes that were arising due to the start of the industrial revolution. These Americans were social reformers known as progressives. They felt that the changes our country was going through required an establishment of new instruction which correlated with the new industrial age. By 1900, cities were becoming more and more crowded. The bad part about this was simply because much of the people were poor workers that suffered terrible working conditions...
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...“I am in this cause with my whole heart and soul. I believe that the Progressive movement is making life a little easier for all our people; a movement to try to take the burdens off the men and especially the women and children of this country. I am absorbed in the success of that movement.” – Theodore Roosevelt Progressivism reached its peak in the United States during the late 19th century, in which it was a reform movement that many took part in to make the country excel in all areas of society including: politically, socially, and economically. Progressives wanted to eliminate waste and corruption, supported improved child labor laws, minimum wage legislation, graduated income tax, and equality for all citizens. With this, progressivism...
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...Reformation The United States went through a very important time period of industrialization, in the 19th century many rural societies in America became industrial. While industrialization brought about an increased volume of variety in manufactured goods and improved standard of living. Most workers in this time period went through grim employment, and horrible living conditions for the poor and working classes. At the same time this time, an age known as the Gilded Age, was an era of rapid growth, especially in the North and West America. In addition to Gilded Age, came a movement named the Progressive Movement. The Progressive movement's main goal was to wipe out corruption in government. At this very key time in history, there were many...
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...Issues Of The Progressive Era People in the progressive era faced many abuses and issues. The working conditions during this time were dirty and dangerous. Also there was a lot of political corruption like the government not giving everyone rights such as women being able to voting (before the 19th amendment). People during this time fought for reform in these issues. They fought these issues by creating laws, protesting...etc. These are some issues occurring during this time and how they reformed it and who was doing the reforming. One issue during the progressive era is bad working conditions. During this time people worked in unsafe environments and minimum wage. There was child labor, no insurance and lots of people getting hurt on the...
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...The Progressive Era reformers and the Federal Government was not effective in bringing about reform at the national level because the reforms left out people that are still marginalized. African Americans, women, and immigrants are the groups of people that have been discriminated during the Progressive Era because of their race or gender. The food manufacturing industry and child labor laws are the only things that have successfully transformed, but they are nothing compared to the discrimination that certain people in the United States have faced. The discrimination towards African Americans during the Progressive area was tremendous. During 1890-1920 America was growing rapidly, which meant there was numerous opportunities for people to have a better life style. This was not the case for most African Americans because they were still being discriminated. They were being publicly humiliated, treated differently for political reasons, and even had differing access to things such as health care and their education. The way African Americans have been treated has not drastically changed over time proving that the Progressive Era was not successful not only for African Americans, but also for women. Women of all races have...
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...The Progressive Era, (1890s-1920s) was an age of reform, the nation’s response to the industrial revolution. Its effects touched virtually all Americans and transformed the role of government in American society. Although some areas of American life, namely, racial issues and women's rights, were neglected during the progressive age, the groundwork was laid for future reforms in those areas and others. After reviewing the Progressive Movement of the first two decades, the key principles were Democracy, Municipal Administration, Efficiency, the regulation of large corporations and monopolies, social work, and conservationism. The Progressives failed to achieve all their goals because, despite their efforts, they never fully came to terms with the divisions and conflicts in American society. Again and again, they acknowledged the existence of social disharmony more fully and frankly than had nineteenth-century Americans. Thus progressivism inevitably fell short of its rhetoric and intentions. Lest this seem an unfairly critical evaluation, it is important to recall how terribly ambitious were the stated aims and true goals of the reformers. They missed some of their marks because they sought to do so much. And, despite all their shortcomings, they accomplished an enormous part of what they set out to achieve. No, the first war can't be regarded as a Progressive conflict, that wasn't what the War was about and I would only see it as an impediment for the Progressive Reforms...
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...Progressive Era through the Great Depression Joana Lewis Joel Goldstein, PhD. Contemporary U.S. History August 2, 2012 Although women spear headed many significant Progressive era reforms, they were still denied the right to vote. This became increasingly problematic once more and more women understood that individuals in the Industrial Age were buffeted by social and economic forces that were beyond their control and that required the involvement of the federal government. The denial of suffrage changed during the Progressive era, beginning in the western states. To main groups furthered the cause of women’s suffrage: the National American Women Suffrage Association, founded in 1890, and the National Women’s Party, founded in 1913 and led by Alice Paul. The NAWSA worked state to state to convince opponents that were valuable assets to society and deserved to vote. Paul and the NWP, on the other hand, pursued a more aggressive national strategy. On the eve of President Woodrow Wilson’s inauguration in 1913, Alice Paul organized a rally of 5,000 women to demand a federal constitutional amendment giving women the right to vote. She also held a six-month vigil outside the White House to protest restrictions of women suffrage. The combined efforts of these two groups ultimately led to victory. In 1920 just after the end of World War 1, the Nineteenth amendment was passed, and women won the right to vote. Woodrow Wilson became president in...
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...In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, several problems plagued America. Citizens were unhappy with low pay and long hours, a lack of safety in the workplace and the misuse of young children in the factory setting. Living conditions in cities were also very unpleasant, due to overpopulation by immigration and a serious lack sanitation of city streets. Reformers of the Progressive Era effectively addressed and resolved these issues. One area of reform in the late 19th century and early 20th century was in the workplace. Laborers were paid extremely low wages, were constantly at risk for injury or death, and worked in inadequate conditions. An example of workers being at risk is the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. Due to locked doors and several infringements in fire safety, 146 workers–most of them young women–were either killed by the fire or jumped to their deaths from 8th and 9th story windows. As far as wages go, owners of factories could pay workers as little as they wanted to, since there was no minimum wage set. Owners could also...
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...In the broad context, there was a large build-up to the Progressive Era, that truly began after the conclusion of the American Civil war, when the Reconstruction Era Began. The reconstruction Era was the U.S. essentially trying to build itself and find itself, thus leading to vast growth. Too much of a good thing is not such a good thing, however, and this lead to the Gilded Age. A Period of political machines, monopolies, harsh industrial conditions, and many other horrendous happenings. The goal of the Progressive Era was to fix these issues. (Contextualization) Progressive reforms were remarkably successful in achieving the improvement of society, primarily by implementing more tolerable working conditions and ending corruption in politics....
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...Discontent: The Rise and Fall of the Progressive Movement in America written by Michael McGerr is about the development of Progressivism and the large reform movement it called for by making the middle class the dominant class instead of the “Upper Ten.” Progressivism was the idea of transforming America and getting the middle class the power that the progressives thought they deserved. “Progressivism demanded a social transformation that remains at once profoundly impressive and profoundly disturbing a century later” (McGerr XV). Progressivism set the stage for ambitious America that was not quite ready for the change, but still makes an impact to this day with government and reforms. The Progressive movement began when the tension with the “Upper Ten” and when their extravagant lifestyles truly started to show. They were flaunting everything they did from mansions to parties. McGerr lets the readers know how displeased the “others” were with the extravagant celebrations and parties the “Upper Ten” constantly threw. This ended up spurring the ideology for progressivism and the reform the middle class called for....
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...Progressives believed that people united behind a common cause could erase the social ills that plagued society. At this time progressive ranks filled with native born, white middle class urbanities. Then, progressive's attempts to enact social reform depended on them controlling other group’s actions and behavior (Discussion Board-9). For the most part of American history were full of the supremacy of white and the black peoples' activities as a result, there are a lot of unbalanced and one side history information that comes from the history writers (Discussion Board-7). For this reason, the progressive movement run for primary goal, to change the reforms of American life style from imperialist political ideology to socialism and marched...
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